Integration with custom HTTP client and custom json library

[MWGuy]

Description

Integration with custom http clients may be helpful if we already has http client in our context, RestTemplate in spring boot for example. This also applies to json serializing/deserializing libraries.

[alallema]

Hi @MWGuy,
Thank you for raising this issue ❤️ , and so sorry for the delay.

Integration with custom http clients may be helpful if we already has http client in our context

This was the case before the refactoring of this SDK. However, after the release of v0.27.0 of Meilisearch, the PATCH http method became mandatory to allow some requests, so we decided to propose only the OKHttp client, which is one of the only ones to propose this method natively.

[relufi]

With the current setup I can't even customize the timeout time of the request, just use the default parameters of okhttp

[relufi]

For the json part, the search api always returns HashMap<String, Object>, why not use generics?

[relufi]

What about the default use of new GsonJsonHandler() when building Config, and the fixed use of org.json in the search api's SearchRequest class toString? Why not just use one json library

[brunoocasali]

Hi @relufi, this library stayed for a long time due to some unfinished refactoring/improvement started by a contributor, and it was our fault for accepting such harmful changes.

After that we decided to simplify the source code here by removing some of the "options" like configuring the HTTP handler. After @alallema's work, we saw the usage increase and also the number of contributions, so we consider it a success!

I agree with you that not being able to configure something as simple as the timeout is not ideal, and I encourage you or anyone else to submit a clear PR with that change. We are more than welcome to accept contributions to all of our integrations, especially when they address real problems, are clear in purpose, useful, and have test coverage!

I hope you understand, that we are a small team and we need to carefully use our time :)